Talk out on 106.7; flip to hits likely

Last year, Cox radio flipped former hip-hop station 106.7 FM (KPWT) to a largely conservative commercial talk format. Preceding the flip was lots of stunting promising Christmas music. Tee-hee.

Then came the real plan: Hosts — such as Laura Ingraham, Dr. Laura, Michael Savage and Clark Howard — were supposed to float your boat.

Clearly, they didn’t float it enough. Just 10 months later, the station wiped out the talk and started making promises again — appropriately on April Fool’s Day. Amid clocks ticking on the air, a voice hints at a format that should please a lot of S.A. listeners. (Where did I hear that before?)

This time, however, cash is being offered if your guess as to what’ll replace it is close to the real thing. Five winners will be awarded $1,000 each for their wily guesses.

To participate, search 106.7 and click on Mystery on Facebook.

Or if you prefer your radio without such tiring fun and games, listen in at 5 p.m. Monday and see what Cox is handing you now.

Some in the know are guessing a return of hip-hop. Another radio entity tells me Gen X radio — grunge, hip-hop, alternative, modern rock — is hot so it could be 106.7 will go that route.

However, the radio buzz sites indicate that Cox registered 1067river.com Thursday. And since Cox already owns the Atlanta “River” station 97.1 — home of “Classic Hits” of the Sting, Elton John and Tom Petty variety — I’m betting 106.7 will go the “all classic hits, all the time” route.

But you can bet — in this cost-cutting climate — they won’t be paying local DJs.

Cox programming pooh-bah Virgil Thompson wasn’t talking Thursday except to confirm talk had gone bye-bye and that I should tune in Monday to find out the rest..

Meanwhile, some folks — namely, those who had shows on talk 106.7 — learned the news. . .the hard way. Steven Stoli wrote: “Talk about an April Fools surprise. Me and Wayne (Harrell) my co-host on the ‘Dig In Garden Show’ on FM 106.7 got a call from station reps that the format was changing and it would no longer be talk format. We had to ask three times if this wasn’t a joke. So when we tuned into the station today. . . nothing but a clock ticking. OK, no joke. ”

Stoli went on to say it was a shame as their gardening show “was rapidly gaining listeners and callers. We were about to go to a two hour show…. but.”

P. S. If you were a fan, here’s a silver lining: “We are not completely out of the media,” Stoli said. “We will start producing gardening videos for “Good Day SA” (on KENs) this month.